Automated bid for video reach campaigns

On this page

• Overview
• Key benefits
• How automated bid works
• Supported campaign types and networks
• Steps to set up automated bid
• Best practices

Overview

When you create video reach campaigns (VRC) in Google Ads, you can now automate setting an explicit bid target (Target CPM).

With automated bid, you can launch brand, and awareness video campaigns without calculating or entering a manual bid. Google Ads automatically manages and dynamically adjusts your bids in real time to ensure your campaign spends its entire budget efficiently.

If you prefer strict control over your unit costs, you can still choose to specify a manual Target CPM (tCPM) at any time.

Key benefits

• Simplified campaign setup: Eliminates the complexity and uncertainty of predicting competitive bids, which is particularly beneficial when starting new campaigns or reaching new audiences lacking historical performance data.
• Full budget delivery: Prevents campaign under-delivery caused by overly restrictive bid caps. The bidding system dynamically adjusts bids throughout the flight to ensure 100% budget utilization.
• Optimized results: Maximize budget efficiency, and eliminate the need to research, set, or frequently adjust bids.
• Seamless flexibility and control: Effortlessly switch between automated bidding (no bid entered) and manual target bidding. This can be done during campaign creation, within ad group settings, directly from reporting tables, or or while duplicating campaigns.
• Streamlined campaign performance estimation: Get accurate forecast in the campaign construction panel with only budget, campaign dates, and video creative, without the need for bid entries.

How automated bid works

Supported campaign types and networks

• Eligible campaign subtypes:
  • Video reach campaigns:
    • Efficient reach (tCPM)
    • Non-skippable (tCPM)
    • Target frequency (tCPM)
• Networks: YouTube, Google video partners (GVP), and Google TV (GTV).
• Budget types: Supported for both daily budgets and campaign total budgets.

Steps to set up automated bid

1. Set up automated bid in a new campaign

1. Go to Campaigns within the Campaigns menu .
2. Select plus icon to create a New campaign.
3. Choose YouTube reach, view, and engagement (or create a campaign without a goal's guidance), then select Video.
4. Select your campaign subtype.
5. Set your campaign name, budget, dates, and targeting criteria.
6. In the Bid section at the Ad group level:
   • To use automated bidding (recommended): Leave the default setting as it is. You don’t need to enter a bid amount.
   • To set a manual target: Select the checkbox next to Set a target tCPM and enter your desired target amount.
7. Add your video creative and select Create campaign.

2. Update bidding in Ad group settings (post-launch)

1. Go to Ad groups within the Campaigns menu .
2. Select the Ad group you want to edit, then select Edit Settings .
3. Open the Bidding section.
4. Toggle between automatic and target bidding:
   • Check Set a target to enter a manual bid.
   • Uncheck Set a target to return to automatic bidding.
5. Select Save.

3. Update bidding directly in the Ad group table

1. Go to Ad groups within the Campaigns menu .
2. In the bid column for your campaign's bidding strategy:
   • Campaigns utilizing automated bidding, display as Automated in the Target CPM reporting table.
   • Campaigns with a manual target, display the numerical bid amount (for example, $5.00 USD).
3. Hover over the cell and select the Pencil icon .
4. Select Automated bidding or enter a specific Target bid.
5. Select Save.

4. Manage bids in campaign copy paste workflows

When duplicating existing Video campaigns or Ad groups using copy paste:

1. Copy your desired campaign or Ad group and paste it into your account.
2. In the Adjust Bids configuration window:
   • Let Google handle my bid (use automated bidding): Clears existing manual bids and transitions the new campaign to automatic bidding.
   • Keep existing bids: Retains the exact numerical bids from the original copied campaign.
   • Apply bid guidance: Applies suggested static bid benchmarks where applicable.
3. Confirm your selection and complete the paste operation.

Best practices

• Allow for an initial ramp-up period: When you launch a campaign with automatic bidding, allow 24 hours for the bidding system to adjust to the auction dynamics before making significant updates to your audience or budget.
• Align budgets with audience size: Ensure your budget is proportional to the size of your targeted audience. Combining extremely narrow audience targeting combined with high budgets can result in elevated average CPMs. This occurs as the automated bid system prioritizes spending your entire budget.
• Review performance trends: Monitor delivery, unique reach, and average CPM in your Google Ads reporting columns to evaluate delivery efficiency and adjust your marketing mix accordingly.